Sign Up for Our Living with Crohn's Disease Newsletter

Thanks for signing up!

A man with Crohn's disease may want to take his lover in his arms but feel too worried and distracted by bowel issues to make a move. This struggle is an all too common and difficult one for men (and women) with Crohn's disease.

Join us as we spend an hour with comedian and Crohn's disease patient Ben Morrison as he takes a no nonsense look at intimacy and Crohn's disease for men. From the worst nightmare - an accident in bed - to feelings of uncertainty that you're embarrassed to share, Ben will share some humbling stories of his own and give you advice for making things work with your partner. Plus, you'll get practical tips on how to keep romance alive when you're physically limited, and find out how to stay confident despite the challenges of Crohn's.

As always, our guest answers questions from the audience.

Announcer:
Welcome to this HealthTalk webcast. Before we begin, we remind you that the opinions expressed on this webcast are solely the views of our guests. They are not necessarily the views of HealthTalk, our sponsors or any outside organization. And, as always, please consult your own physician for the medical advice most appropriate for you.

Our guest reports that he has received funding from UCB Pharma.

Now here's your host, Rick Turner.

Rick Turner:
You may have seen him on the comedy circuits or on MTV's Punk'd, or in his infamous one-man show, “Pain in the Ass.” He's Ben Morrison, ladies and gentlemen, and for the next hour he will be our guide on the precarious and winding road of sex, love, and Crohn's disease. Hello and welcome to this HealthTalk webcast, Sex, Love and Intimacy: Comedian Ben Morrison's Guide for Men (and the People Who Love Them). I'm Rick Turner.

So, Ben Morrison, welcome to the webcast. Nice of you to join us today.

Mr. Ben Morrison:
It's going to be a very interesting hour.

Rick:
I hope so. Well, we said we are going to talk about intimacy so let's start with a clip from your show, “Pain in the Ass,” and in this clip you're talking about a doctor visit before you were diagnosed with Crohn's.

“Pain in the Ass” Audio Clip:
I came to his [the doctor’s] office, and I described my symptoms, and he said, “Well, son, because this is a problem with your digestive system, it could be one of many, many different things. We're going to have to run a bunch of tests. This is basically a process of elimination. It could be this, this, this, possibly even this,” [counting with his fingers].

I later came to realize that all these fingers represented thumbs that were going up my ass. You would think medicine would have invented a thumb-o-graphometer or something, or maybe I just had really, old-timey doctors, but apparently the hunt for clues to tummy trouble begins with hitchhiking - if you know what I mean. That doctor said, “We're going to get to the bottom of this,” and boy, he meant it, man. Male thumbs, female thumbs, as long as they were opposable, they were going up my butt.

After a while I got so used to doctors sticking their thumb up my ass that when I walked into a room and saw a white coat, I would be like, “Oh, hey, I'm Ben Morrison. I'm here for the four o'clock. If you could try to be gentle, it's been a really long day.” He would be like, “Son, I'm a dentist.” I would be like, “Oh, ho-ho, force of habit, force of habit. My mom said I was getting a cavity filled, and I immediately just assumed that it was - you know, it's been a really weird couple of months.” You couldn't check anyway?

Rick:
It doesn't get much more intimate than that, Ben.

Mr. Morrison:
No, it doesn't.

Rick:
Eventually in your diagnosis they did figure out that you had Crohn's disease. Tell us when that was and what was going on in your life at that time.

Mr. Morrison:
I was a senior in high school, 1997. My symptoms actually wound up being on the much more diagnosable side for Crohn's, because as it turned out, I had a full-blown bowel obstruction. My ileum was basically shriveled up, so once they did a small bowel series, that's where you go in and drink lots of barium, which is also part of my show - I describe barium as a thick, white chalky liquid. It looks like a McDonald's vanilla shake except without the flavor or the happy. And then you wait there for roughly an hour and a half while you try to hide your left butt cheek from the world because the hospital gowns for some reason have never heard of Velcro. And then they X-ray your gut, because the barium they can see on the X-ray machine, and they saw mine pretty quickly. With a bowel obstruction, you see the whole intestinal tract, and you would definitely see where it just stops flowing basically.

Rick:
So did they tell you at that time, I think you have Crohn's disease?

Mr. Morrison:
I found out quicker than most only because my symptoms were also very acute and were very painful. They basically just turned on. I would eat food and then would have kind of a stabbing pain because when you have got an obstruction, basically nothing can go through. And the part that is sealed off is really inflamed, and then you deal with really bad gas pains because you can't even pass that through. So it's like a gigantic log jam pushing up against a really, really pissed off traffic cop.

Rick:
And it hurts.

Mr. Morrison:
It does, yeah. And, you know, it's weird, I'm thinking about this now, and I really don't remember even having a couple of months of eating food and having stomach pain and then passing it through and going from there. I remember I stayed in the house, and that night the pain began.

Rick:
So it was pretty much out of the blue for you. How did that change your life?

Mr. Morrison:
Well, it kind of changes everyone's life. I think what's kind of funny is, I was kind of a chubby kid in high school. And there is nothing like these terrible intestinal disorders to help you drop those extra pounds, although I couldn't stop dropping them once I had gotten to an adequate weight. I think I lost about 25 pounds because I couldn't really eat. I didn't know what my body did and didn't agree with yet, and that for most Crohn's patients is the biggest task - the self-discovery of what exactly their body will deal with.

They put me on a heavy round of steroids, which I am sure any of the Crohn's patients listening are very at home with. Prednisone. And it was rough. I mean, prednisone, while addressing the inflammation of the Crohn's, it causes enough physical changes in your body that those become almost as uncomfortable as the Crohn's in the first place. You get vicious mood swings, your face balloons out, gets red. All of those things happened to me. I also had really bad acne at the time, and the steroids just really, really, really inflamed the acne. It was pretty bad.

Rick:
Right. So you get this diagnosis of Crohn's, you go on these terrible doses of steroids, and yet somehow this leads to your deciding to do stand-up comedy in response to that. How did that come about?

Mr. Morrison:
Stand-up, as a factor in my existence, kind of happened when I was 20. The short story of why I began doing stand-up was, I was in a bar kind of drunk. My girlfriend was dancing around the whole place. There was a person next to me who I was later told was a comedy club booker. I don't remember much of it, but apparently before kind of passing out I booked a comedy gig and then wound up doing it. So stand-up just kind of happened in New York, and I was halfway through theater school at NYU at the time and just kept doing it in conjunction with the theater.

Then I began to get really sick in New York. I went into remission after high school, and if I remember correctly, I had a couple of years of not having an awareness of it, and then it began to come back. And once that began again, I was back clenching my stomach and running to the bathroom after not being able to go to the bathroom for two days and being back in that world. And the first memory I have of doing a piece of “Pain in the Ass” live wasn't in the context of it being in a one-man show. I was doing just a set on a Saturday night at this little underground room near Columbia University, and earlier in the day, I had gotten a bill from my medical insurance for a colonoscopy that I had received. And they had declined payment for the colonoscopy because their board or whoever had decided that it wasn't a necessary procedure.

And so I said to the audience, “Oh, so they think I was just sitting around my house really bored one day, and I said you know what? I haven't seen the inside of my own ass in a little while. And I have got $10,000 just laying around.” And as I said this, the audience began laughing, and they were laughing with me, not at me. And of course after that, I told them what it was about - I have Crohn's, and there I was telling complete strangers who were laughing with me about my poop disease and the goings on inside my rectum, and I wasn't embarrassed. And because it was funny, they kind of wanted to hear more.

Rick:
And so it grew from that?

Mr. Morrison:
Yeah, it really did. And at that moment, I realized that I kind of had something here because humor, I think, is what Crohn's patients need to discuss what they go through.

Rick:
Right. Well, good for you for recognizing that. And at that time you say you were in New York out on your own, and I'm sure you had a love life, and you have this resurgence of Crohn's disease wracking your body. How did that impact dating?

Mr. Morrison:
It still does. I mean, I still have active Crohn's, although I am a lot wiser right now about what will and won't cause disturbances. As far as dating goes, it definitely affects dating, but sex is just one part of the larger rearrangement that you are going to need to have your life undergo.

To a certain degree it forces you to really address yourself and take stock of who you are and why you are doing what you are doing, because the universe is just making it hard to be you. This is a total tangent, but I do believe that the hardships we're given are meant to test the people who are meant to be great. Does that make sense?

Rick:
Sure. Well, another way to look at that is you're taking a very tough situation and you're turning it into one that can positively impact other people's lives.

Mr. Morrison:
Acting found me first. Just being a performer found me when I was six, so I am taking it in the order that the universe gave me as far as my order of importance. And I think that, coupled with the most amazing parents and sister in the whole world allowed me to be able to kind of address it in this way, just because of the amounts of love and support and the path that I had been on for so long before I got Crohn's. So I understand that everyone's situation is not like mine, but I beg people to take stock of what they were given in their search for their life.

Anyway, getting back to dating. It makes a big difference because when you go out on dates, you tend to drink, and drinking, while an amazing amount of fun, also tends to inflame Crohn's.

Rick:
And you mean drinking alcohol?

Mr. Morrison:
Yeah. I mean, if we are being honest right here especially for dating, what do you do on a date? You go to a bar. So that's part of the equation too, as far as what people do on dates, what can and can't you do and how will that affect it. I have vivid memories of being back in New York, and a girl that I was seeing was waiting in my bedroom, and we were going to get intimate. And I remember being in the bathroom, and at that point, the obstruction had flared up again like there was a baby in my stomach. I could see it. Whenever I obstruct, I distend, like my stomach sticks out. And moving hurts because, basically 30-some odd feet of intestine above the actual colon is filled, and it ain't going anywhere, so moving hurts.

And, you know, I don't know how you make love, but I like to move around a little bit. And it's kind of difficult when, (a) you are worried about farting. When you jostle enough, it's going to happen. And, (b), you're like I don't really know if I can enjoy this much when I feel like I have ten extra pounds in me. So I remember being in the bathroom just on the can just hoping I can get something out so I could enjoy this night of sex.

Rick:
You mentioned earlier that you are wiser now, and that you have learned how to take care of your body and that helps you predict what your body is going to do, and how it's going to react later. So what do you do these days to take care of yourself?

Mr. Morrison:
A lot. And I will restate their disclaimer: I am not a doctor nor am I a medical professional, however I have had a lot of experience with this. What it was for me was finding out what not to eat. I would say even more than the medications I was on, it was really more about what I was putting in my body. I kind of stick to a rice-based diet. I try to avoid as much heavy wheat as possible. I don't eat heavy pastas. I know what my symptoms are. When I flare, I have a lack of, let's just say “circumference,” so I have learned that things I want to put in my body are things that my body doesn't need to work very hard to break down and pass through.

Rick:
Okay. Do you exercise, Ben?

Mr. Morrison:
Yeah, very frequently, and that's another thing that I wanted to talk about. Exercise is extremely important. I am going to use a real nerd reference here, but there is an old movie called “The Neverending Story” that a lot of us have seen, and it's one of my favorites. It's a kid's fantasy film. It the hero is trying to fight the Nothing erasing his whole kingdom, and he takes his horse, Artex - and this is so dorky, but people who know it will love it - through the swamp called the Swamps of Sadness. And the way this works in the children's story is that if you allow the sadness to overtake you, you begin sinking, and you won't sink if you don't let it. And he loses his horse, but don't worry, it's not that tragic.

And the reason I bring that up is, I have met a number of Crohn's patients who have kind of let themselves begin sinking. And they don't realize that it's an option and not a sentence. Does that make sense?

Rick:
Absolutely. Now, if I can pick up on the other things that you might do. You watch your diet carefully. You exercise on a regular basis. What about coping with stress? You're in kind of a stressful job, doing stand-up comedy and performing in front of a lot of people.

Mr. Morrison:
Well, let me just say one more thing about exercise, and then I'll address stress.Because I, much like many Crohn's patients, was very, very skinny. I look at old photos of myself, and I can't believe how skinny and frail I looked, which is funny because I felt that way too. But if you exercise, you build muscle. This is a point that I think Crohn's patients need to understand and hopefully will spur them on to begin the process of building muscle, because muscle is just straight up good. Muscle is a good force in the body. It's the White Knight, and it always fights for you. It burns calories. It wants you to be healthy and strong. It's a natural material in your body, and when you work out ,you build more muscle. So for me working out makes sense because I am building more actual part of my body that’s sole job is to fight for my body. Does that make sense?

So it's extremely important that you maintain muscle mass in your body because the muscle mass is what will fight for you. It will keep you from feeling too fat or too bloated. And it will restore a lot of pride when you look in the mirror, when you are feeling down if you look at yourself and you admire what you have created and maintained. And anyone has the ability to do that. It is just a matter of their willingness to put themselves through what needs to be done to attain that.

And that's piggybacking on stress. You do the exact same thing. I am currently work-shopping my one-man show - which I will plug heavily when it's time - but I am looking forward to going to the gym once I am off this call. I have recently discovered jumping rope. I do it to dance music. It's so much fun. And I am totally out of breath and my heart rate is up, and I burn a lot of calories, and in the time that I am doing it, I am not stressing about things. And doing what I do, yes, is extremely stressful, and if you don't get an audition - I am waiting on a call right now for something big. I can't think about it. It's out of my hands.

So exercise is a way, at the very least, to force yourself to address something other than that stress. Yes. Stress is a killer with Crohn's. I have talked about this in my show. There is a reason that you say, “Oh, I had a gut reaction.” Crohn's takes place in your gut. It's one and the same. Like your brain has such a direct link to your intestines, and I don't know if you have noticed it, but if you look at the brain and you look at intestines, they kind of look similar. I'll just throw that out there for you.

Rick:
Many HealthTalk listeners often ask how do you, or when do you, tell a potential partner, a date, about something like Crohn's disease? When should it come up in the conversation?

Mr. Morrison:
There shouldn't be a deadline, and there shouldn't be a need to open with it. I tell most people it's not a big deal. It's really not a big deal. In fact, almost every single person I have told knows someone who has it.

Rick:
Really?

Mr. Morrison:
Yeah. It's not like I am stuck explaining what Crohn's is.

Rick:
I would think that would be the biggest hurdle is people say what's Crohn's? But not so, huh?

Mr. Morrison:
Honestly, I wish it wasn't the case. But yeah. Particularly when I say, “Oh, I have this messed up digestive system,” whatever, just kind of jokingly. And they say, “Oh, what's the problem?” And I go, “Yeah, I have this thing called Crohn's disease.” And they go, “Oh, wow, Crohn's, my college roommate had that,” or “Oh, my sister has that,” or “Oh, my aunt.” I swear.

Rick:
That's interesting.

Mr. Morrison:
More often than not, someone knows someone who has it, and they know how bad it is. But I'll use the old phrase, “chicks dig scars.” And people need to realize this. Like shame plays far too heavy a role in people's experience with Crohn's, and it winds up causing the lion's share of the unhappiness they get from it, and it's unnecessary.

Rick:
The personal shame?

Mr. Morrison:
Yes, that they place upon themselves. I say, instead of looking at it where you have a disease where you can't stop farting, or you have explosive diarrhea, think about it like when you are sitting in a room full of your boys, and everyone is laughing, and they begin telling the worst fart stories, you are going to win. And that way of looking at it flips it on its end.

There is an experience I will never forget in my entire life. I worked at Camp Oasis, which is the CCFA (Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation) camp, when I first began doing this show. All the kids have Crohn's, and all the counselors have Crohn's. [It’s a] really emotional time because a lot of these kids could not have gone to a sleep-away camp. The CCFA has set these up so that they are at an actual sleep-away camp, but of course there are registered nurses on call, etc., and they have their custom diets.

But they kind of let me do what I wanted because they knew me, and I taught improv to all levels of the class. And it began with like the youngest kids, and at the end I went and did part of “Pain in the Ass” for them, which I retitled “Pain in the Butt” for the younger set. And at the end of it, I did part of my show to show them that I could be funny. I think I did the thumbs part, and I got some laughs, because they weren't quite used to laughing about it. Then I sat down with them, and I said, “Now I want one of you to get up there totally on your own on and tell your most embarrassing Crohn's story.”

Rick:
Oh, my goodness.

Mr. Morrison:
They were like, “What, are you serious?” And I was like, “Trust me, just trust me, okay? It's a stage. We're your audience. Tell us.” So a kid got up there who had an ostomy bag, an external colon, and he told a story of when he was taking a math test in the fourth grade, and he began to feel it fill up, and he asked the teacher, he said, “Hey, I've got to go to the bathroom.” She said, “Sit down and finish your test.” And ten minutes later he was like, it's definitely getting full. He stood up again, and he said, “I really need into go to the bathroom.” And she said, “Finish your test, it's almost over.”

Ten minutes later he looked down, and it was at capacity. And for those who don't know what an ostomy is, it's an actual pouch that sits on the outside of the body that acts as your colon, and it needs to be emptied. And so ten minutes again go by, and he stands up, and he says I need to go to the bathroom, and she says, “Go sit down and finish your…” and the second she said it, there was a huge popping sound. It exploded and showered her and half the room with his digestive contents. And I am telling you the room full of Crohn's patients, they broke out into an applause break. It was the funniest thing anyone had every heard. And the kid stood on the stage, and he was beaming.

Rick:
He brought down the house, huh?

Mr. Morrison:
And then there wasn't enough time for people to tell their most embarrassing Crohn's stories. Literally in that one moment, just looking at it differently, it turns one of his biggest traumas into one of his biggest social triumphs. That's the power of just deciding to look at this differently.

Rick:
I am curious about your use of humor, because I am sure, like those kids you were at camp with, they think “I can't do that. I can't be funny or extroverted about this. This is embarrassing to me.” How do people get by that hurdle?

Mr. Morrison:
You just talk about it. Crohn's is hilarious. When it's not ravaging your body, it's a pretty funny disease. I mean, look at the Farrelly Brothers' movies. I mean, what are the funniest scenes? The explosive diarrhea scenes - those are our lives. Come on, you have got to see the humor in that. You know? I'm sorry, but sometimes when I run to the bathroom and drop my pants and I hear like a 747 coming out of my ass, I do start laughing because that's a funny sound, and I refuse to ignore how funny that is, and people just need to accept that.

Rick:
Well, we want to get to some more stories from you and advice, but first you also offer little tips about accidents in your one-man show, so let's listen to this clip from “Pain in the Ass.”

“Pain in the Ass” Audio Clip:
I’ll give you a little bit of advice. If you have Crohn's, keep matches with you wherever you go. Sometimes I leave some deuces that would kill a dragon. That's how bad they are, and you cannot rely on the person to have the ol' Lysol spray. You cannot. Keep a couple of matches, shhhh, and then they walk in and then they smell that you have been lighting matches, but at least you tried. Matches. I am telling you. Matches.

I've also learned that from now on, I am only buying underwear that is colored brown or black. Pretty simple, isn't it? And I will hide them from the world.

Rick:
Well, thanks, Ben. That sounds like good advice.

Now, Ben, suppose you are out on a date with someone you really want to impress and something happens. There is an accident. What is the best way to respond to that? Are matches and camouflage underwear enough to do the trick?

Mr. Morrison:
You want the real answer to this? If you are on a date and you are going to the bathroom, and if you already feel an accident, stop moving your butt. This sounds weird, but that is what you have got to do. Say you are at a restaurant and all of a sudden something comes out. Basically you're sharked, to use the term from that Ben Stiller film.

Get to a bathroom. Move your hiney as little as possible, kind of do the cowboy walk, and then once in there, clean as best you can and get out of your system what needs to be gotten out, because if you have had a little come through, that probably means your colon is filled with, let's just say diarrhea. You need to get that out too. Use the bathroom, and then if it was bad enough that you had an incident, it's probably going to smell, and that's when you break out the matches that I talked about. And I swear to God, that is an absolute lifesaver. These matches literally will kill all the funk in a room, and again, like I say, it might smell like matches, but at least you tried.

Rick:
Right. You are burning the methane in the air, right? That's basically what it is.

Mr. Morrison:
Yeah, and that's a lifesaver at parties. That's one of the biggest problems - being out in social situations where there is a long line for one bathroom where if you just dropped the funk bomb in the bathroom, they're going to know once you leave.

But as far as being out with a girl, the matches are a very good step. And I say in the show, I literally now only buy underwear that's brown or black, and realizing that was such a simple, idiotic, extremely useful realization for me, because why not? Why not? Why make life harder on yourself?

Rick:
Right. And then once you have the accident, how do you explain it?

Mr. Morrison:
You don't. There is no need to. If you have done it properly, they will not be the wiser, and you can joke about it later. The point is just to literally keep it in its own little special place. Because it doesn't need to be this huge terror that you live under about telling people. It doesn't need to be. It feels like it should be, but it doesn't need to be.

Rick:
Is there a way to avoid accidents altogether, or do you find out they are always going to happen?

Mr. Morrison:
They're always going to happen. They don't happen that often. I think it's kind of funny when they do. I mean, if it's not too embarrassing. Everyone is going to have them, you know, once a year, once every other year. But you find out that it happens to normal people too. I have heard a number of stories of people having accidents, and you just talk about, oh, the fart that went too far. You know? And I have heard as many good stories about that from people who don't have Crohn's as from people who do. I think that Crohn's patients forget that everyone has to poop. You know?

Rick:
Have you ever had a reaction from a date, a woman that dumped you because of Crohn's?

Mr. Morrison:
Nope.

Rick:
Never happened?

Mr. Morrison:
No. Because I don't let it. I do not let it run my life. And any woman will admire you more for having the nuts to overcome what the universe gave you. And anything can be overcome if you are mentally willing to take it on.

Rick:
Let's talk about pain for a second, because you mentioned there is pain with Crohn's disease. The difficulties of intimacy are readily apparent when you are in pain. That can be a major obstacle. So is sex, intimacy even an option when you are in that kind of pain?

Mr. Morrison:
No. But that also means that the woman you are dating gets a lot of good back rubs if you have eaten the wrong foods. Anyone is going to understand this. It doesn't have to be this huge thing. So you just say, “Look, hey, I am super full. In the morning I will be a wild stallion. How about for right now you get a great back rub and maybe I take care of you for the night.” And who would say no to that? Why would anyone say no to that? And then you have not only told them that you have active Crohn's, you are suffering from it, but you did it with pride. You did it in a way that isn't shaming yourself. And then you say, “I would like to do is give you a back rub.” And they are going to see your almost noble ability to not let it control how you interact with them, and that will make them admire you more.

Rick:
Have you met people, Ben, who have cut themselves off from intimacy completely because of their Crohn's?

Mr. Morrison:
Intimacy, I am not quite sure. I will just assume yes because I get e-mails from Crohn's patients often, sometimes daily, and they tell me their stories. Because I have told them mine, they tell me theirs. And I get a lot of people using humor in how they tell me their stories too, and I've actually read quite a few extremely funny e-mails from people. But I have also read quite a few disturbing e-mails, because they have severed themselves from the world. They have decided that their selection by the universe to have this means that what comes in tandem with that is their ferreting themselves away.

Rick:
And what do you say to them?

Mr. Morrison:
I say that's the exact wrong way to look at it. If you do that, it wins. And I think we need to discuss even like the Freudian implications of having Crohn's. You know?

Rick:
How so?

Mr. Morrison:
Let's get down to it: Crohn's, what happens to you? It involves fecal matter. It involves poop. And even Freud said that was only the second most embarrassing thing in people's lives. Ever. And that's what happens with people who have Crohn's. They lose the ability to feel as an adult that they have control over their bowels. And that's like something that happens when you are two. And then that mental fortitude as a human being that you at least have control over how you deposit your feces is taken from you. It's scaled back, and it's put in someone else's control, and people don't know how to talk about that.

Rick:
Well, you certainly do. It sounds like you have not allowed Crohn's to dictate your lifestyle, your friendships, anything along those lines. So that tells us that open, healthy communication is a key part of coping with this. Would you agree?

Mr. Morrison:
I can't tell you how much I agree. And that goes hand in hand with living life. I don't agree with keeping things bottled up. I agree with keeping things in a very special place that you put inside yourself for a reason, but things that you feel are happening to you that you need to release, need to be released. And the shame and consequences of having Crohn's need to be released, but, you know, I think in the same way when you are two, you gain control over your bowels. When you are 22 and you lose control over them, you have the vocabulary again of a 2-year-old to tell people. And it's only because I began doing stand-up so young, that I had a way to deal with it. That was such a natural way for me to express what was going on, just being in front of people and telling them.

Again, I have thought about this a lot, and I have thought, “Oh, does that mean that I am the only one who was put on this path and was looking at it this way?” And then at that summer camp, this little kid got up there and got an applause that filled the room with his story. And I was laughing my ass off, and that proved to me that no, it's not about I'm the only one. It's just that's such a leap for people to make that, and you are never going to know how much fun swimming is if you stand at the edge of pool being terrified of water.

Rick:
When it comes to communication, Ben, do you think that men and women communicate differently and that it might be especially tough for men?

Mr. Morrison:
For women, it is tough. I know for a fact it is, because guys at the very least have the benefit of punching their best friend in the arm and farting on his face, which is really fun. I love it. It's a lot of fun to do. And any guy knows that. Girls don't. I don't even think the girls fart. I mean, I know they do. I don't really hear it much. I know it must happen. But that puts them, unfortunately, at a definite conversational disadvantage because there is no societal, accepted humorous way to even tell that, “Oh, hey, that was me. You might want to leave the room for the next ten minutes.” So yeah, it makes it more difficult.

But I swear to you if I met a girl who has Crohn's or whatever, and just was hanging out with me and just went like, “Man, you would not believe what I did to that toilet,” I think I would be in love, you know. The confidence that shows is huge, and confidence is everything in the world, at least as far as your advancement in it.

Rick:
It's funny you mention that because I know there are some questions coming in, and I think one of them asks you that very question about “What would you do if…” So let's get right to them. And the first one is from Plainsboro, New Jersey. Are you ready for this?

Mr. Morrison:
Give it to me.

Rick:
This e-mailer writes, “So is this a guide for any woman who wants to have sex with Ben Morrison?”

Mr. Morrison:
It sure is, and if you are going to take notes, I recommend a number two pencil. There will be questions later.

Rick:
Enough said about that. E-mail from San Diego, California, “Have you had plastic surgery on your scar, and if so, has that helped with your self-esteem? Summer is weeks away, and living near the beach, I wouldn't even consider taking my shirt off anymore. Women like confidence, and Crohn's has taken a lot of mine away. I want it back and will do almost anything to get it.”

What's your reaction to that?

Mr. Morrison:
That goes back to my thing about working out. I love my scars. I don't know if I mentioned it previously. I had a bowel resectioning, and I have kind of a Harry Potter thing going on on my belly, a little lightening shaped scar. And that to me, like the tattoo on my arm, reminds me of a time in my life and a thing that I went through.

But to answer the question, yeah. I totally understand how Crohn's has taken confidence from you. What I find very helpful is getting sun, not looking pale, goes a very long way to not feeling like you are a sickly. So I try to lay out and get some melanin in my skin because it makes a huge difference if you feel, at the very least your skin isn't sallow. And you will notice that people will not ask you why you look so sickly a lot. And I am not talking about going and getting a fake tan or lying in a tanning bed, just what a doctor would recommend, just go out in the sun for 15 minutes and just build vitamin D. It really makes you feel good.

Rick:
Yes. Get some color.

Mr. Morrison:
It's so easy to do. Literally, if you have 15 minutes every four or five days, you know. I don't want to give the proper medical amounts, but just allow sun into your skin. It's very easy. It's free. And it will go a long way to making you not feel like you're sick. Because you have got to understand the confidence that people lack is because they look in the mirror, and they see something they are not proud of. They see something that doesn't attract them. So there are very simple things you can do to make that better on yourself, and the advantage is that you actually feel better in the process.

But there are things that you need to address. And work out. I mean, if you are at the beach, nothing is going to make you want to be at the beach like knowing you work out. I just can't stress that enough.

Mr. Morrison:
Interesting question. Not that I have found, no. Although I could see if you were on like prednisone, an anti-inflammatory, that might make your body feel so weird you might not know what was going on.

Rick:
We never did discuss what medications you are on, Ben.

Mr. Morrison:
I have kind of been on all of them. Right now I am on Pentasa (mesalamine), which is probably the lowest level medication that you can be on. I have done Remicade (infliximab). I was on Imuran (azathioprine), which is an immunosuppressant for a long time.

Rick:
So you have run the gamut.

Mr. Morrison:
I have run the gamut. And it got to a point though where I was telling doctors, “Look, I don't want to be on Imuran anymore. I don't want to be on an immunosuppressant.” Taking control or attempting to exert my experience and my ideas into conversations with my doctors took a lot of balls. It's very hard.

Rick:
Yeah. They are the authority figure, right?

Mr. Morrison:
And they hate suggestions, and that's a problem because every person is different. I had to fight to tell the doctor, “I don't want to be on immunosuppressants. I want to live my life. You know, it is not flaring horribly. I have low level. I can deal with it. I'll go on, you know, Pentasa,” which I was on for years, which is a very light drug, thankfully. And I'll say, “Look, we're going to try this for four or five months. If I get sicker, I will think about going on it.”

But, again, it takes some power back for you, and this whole battle revolves around how much of a say your brain feels like it has in what's happening to your body.

Rick:
We will get so some more questions here. This e-mail comes to us from Maple Lake, Minnesota. “I am dating someone with ulcerative colitis. I am always very encouraging to him. How do I get past his fear of an overnight or weekend away?”

Mr. Morrison:
That's a very good question. The woman leads the way. I totally, totally understand this. Well, I think step one is just letting him understand that it doesn't matter. Whatever could happen to him would not affect how you feel about him, your sense of attraction. I think that's it, because that's what people think.

Rick:
Yes. It will turn somebody else off.

Mr. Morrison:
That's the core, people's shame - it's weird. Most people say, “Hey, if I was the last person in the universe, I wouldn't mind it that much because it's just me and my bowels.” But of course you need to live in the universe with other people, so it makes you feel like you don't have an attractive force on people anymore, and that kills relationships when people assume that. And I think, as a significant other who is healthy, you need to be very clear in a very light-hearted manner - not even doing a sit down - just say in passing, you know, “Just so you know, I think you know I am extremely attracted to you, and I have been the whole time, so whatever is happening to you, tell me, cut me in on the experience, and don't get all worried about appearing attractive.”

You know, just boost their ego. Tell them the things about them that they might find attractive and that you love. So your eyes are the most beautiful eyes I have seen, and you have got great biceps, or your teeth, I love your laugh. Replace their supposed shame with pride that you give them on things that are also theirs. And as far as logistically planning, that's up to him, what he needs for an overnight, but anybody with Crohn's disease usually has their kit. So any excuse that he would make, it's not about things. It's about his heart and how he is interpreting it.

Rick:
Well put. Folsom, Pennsylvania is the source of this next e-mail. “I've had ileostomy reversal surgery, but when I am at the moment of intimacy, the need of going to the bathroom immediately comes into play. How do I handle it?”

Now, you have not had that, right? You haven't had an ileostomy?

Mr. Morrison:
No.

Rick:
But what about that urge to immediately go?

Mr. Morrison:
If that is when they cut out your ileum, then yeah, I have had it. But as far as external accoutrements, no.

But the need to go, my answer to that is pretty clear. Go to the bathroom right before walking in the bedroom. Like if you are on the bed and start kissing and clothes start coming off, say, look into her eyes and say I will be right back. And then run in the bathroom, brush your teeth, smell better than when you left, and use the bathroom so you know that whatever might be residing in your colon ain't. So if you feel like you have to go, it doesn't matter. Nothing is going to come out because there's nothing there. So, you know, worry less about that actual sensation than what would happen if that were an actual problem. Does that make sense?

The thing is, no one really minds you excusing yourself to go to the bathroom. At the risk of getting a little dirty here, they are like, “Oh, he's probably going to go to the bathroom and clean himself up a little bit.” No one minds that. Especially before sex.

Rick:
Let's get a question from Washington State. “When you wanted to get intimate with a woman, have you ever had trouble getting an erection because you were so worn out from your symptoms or because you were in pain? And if so, how did you handle the situation?”

Mr. Morrison:
Well, that's a tough situation. I've certainly been in that situation. Every guy has. If you haven't, you're lying. I mean if I am distended, like specifically if I'm really bloated, if I am obstructing for a couple days and my stomach begins to push out, I will steer myself away from organizing a wild night of sex. And if you are dating someone - it's not like an I need to perform right now type of thing, wait until the morning. Give yourself a good night's sleep.

And if it's a one-night stand, which I have certainly had, and as long as we are talking about it, that's a much trickier situation, and you might have to bite the bullet and just say, “Look, this isn't going to happen right now.” Can I take care of you?

Rick:
Yes. As you mentioned earlier, other options, back rubs, etc.

Mr. Morrison:
I mean, if it's happening, it's happening, and you have a naked person in front of you, and if you can't engage them sexually, it kind of feels weird to be naked. So you need to figure out how you can make it comfortable for them. It doesn't happen very often to me, but it has. And like I said, I kind of talk - I joke about everything with everyone - so I've kind of joked about it with women too, and women interpret it typically as it's their fault. And it's not.

It's a joke I do on stage. That women always will say, “Why can't you just keep it hard and maintain your erection?” And it's not like I have control over it. I find out it ain't happening when you find out it ain't happening. Like the male erection is very similar to how some old IBM computers would be run. I go to a room, and I file a request for an erection, and hopefully it's approved, because if not, then I have a very tense meeting with the board of directors later.

Again, my advice to them is, if it's not going to happen, well just say, “Look, it's not going to happen. What can I do for you?” And just say, “Look, it's not you, it's my body. It's not you, I've been sick. How can I help you? What can I do for you?” And just - it's so important: Keep looking in their eyes. Keep smiling when it happens. Tickle them, kiss their neck and re-establish the intimacy that was there ten minutes ago before, in your mind, everything fell apart.

Rick:
Alright. An e-mail from Grand Junction, Colorado, “What is a fair amount of time for a man or woman to wait or not wait to disclose to a person of intimate interest about your disease? To keep them from running away or to say that you tricked them by not being honest with them about something so serious early on?”

Mr. Morrison:
That's a very good question. I don't hide things from people, nor do I tell people I have Crohn's the second I shake their hand. But I made a decision a long time ago to not let this be a decision-maker in my life, and that goes over into every aspect. I have told just about everyone I've been with I have Crohn's. I make jokes about it. That's how I deal with it. It's what I am going through. So as far as the amount of time it will take, it's kind of up to where you are with them conversationally. If you have established a rapport with someone that you like, you don't need to sit them down and have this huge talk like you have an STD or something like that.

Rick:
Right. “There is something really serious I need to tell you.”

Mr. Morrison:
It's not in the same category. It's something that you will never give them. It's just something that's a part of your life. Again, I have found that the best way to bring it up, if they're over, put a hand on your stomach, and say, “Ooh, I probably shouldn't have eaten something.” And they will say, “Oh, what's the matter?” And you say, “Oh, you know, I have a really sensitive stomach.” And they will probably say like, “Yes, I do too,” or yeah totally. And then I will be like, “Yeah, I have a weird stomach. I don't know, I've got a digestive thing that's going on called Crohn's. It's not a big deal, but sometimes it makes certain foods kind of hard to eat.” And lo and behold, you have just told them. And it does not need to be this, “Look, there's something that you need to know about me.” It doesn't need to be that at all.

Rick:
And that example you gave of right now was perfect. It was not a big deal, and yet you have just told them, like you say. I want to get a question from Atlanta, Georgia about fistulas. “How can I treat a fistula when I want to engage in sex with my partner?”

Do you have any experience with fistulas?

Mr. Morrison:
No, all of my symptoms so far have been internal. Unfortunately - I would love to give advice on everything, but this is probably something I would just be winging it on.

Rick:
Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina, this person writes, “What really would happen if your partner had an accident in bed while making love?”

Mr. Morrison:
Every guy has been with a girl who has discovered that it's her time of the month during the act, okay? It ain't that different. What happens when that happens with you and a girl? You probably laugh about it and change the sheets. Same thing. These things are part of us. They are part of our bodies. And we've been conditioned to feel shameful about certain things. Obviously of course it's embarrassing, but we can take that back if we just make a pact with the universe to find everything funny, where it's obviously appropriate. But again, I mean, like if it is going happen to you, it's going to happen. You might as well find the humor in it.

Rick:
Let me see if I can just squeeze in this question from Flushing, New York. “Recently out of an eight-year relationship where I have been with someone that knew everything I was going through with the disease. How do I move forward into a new relationship explaining why I have these strings called setons threaded through my anus, or do I just keep going with the ‘I have the coolest piercings ever’ line?” You have got 30 seconds.

Mr. Morrison:
Piercings, that's a perfect example of what I'm talking about. Of course you keep going with that. Everyone, every human has their big tragedy that they go through. If we could keep Crohn's quiet, or if it happened internally with no outward symptoms, people wouldn't feel this way about it.

Rick:
Ben, I am afraid we are just about out of time. Unfortunately we have to cut it off, so before we go, though, where can listeners get more information about you and your work?

Mr. Morrison:
For all information on media-related things, go to benmorrison.org. You can watch clips from “Pain in the Ass,” you can purchase a DVD.

Rick:
Ben Morrison, we have got to leave it there. Thank you very much for joining us this hour. It's been great.

Mr. Morrison:
Yeah, it's been fantastic. Thank you very much. And everyone, keep hope. It's not the end of the world. You have control over your life.

This site complies with the HONcode standard for trustworthy health information: verify here.

Advertising Notice

This Site and third parties who place advertisements on this Site may collect and use information about
your visits to this Site and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of
interest to you. If you would like to obtain more information about these advertising practices and to make
choices about online behavioral advertising, please click here.